Summer paradise

Dear dudes and dudettes, it seems to be summer outside and the winds are warm even up here in Sweden. We sure love the warmth up here! (Oh well, most of us at least.)

While doing the last of schoolwork for the semester I'm trying to consider what this summer will bring - it's the first time since 2004 that I will not attend Sweden's largest medieval festival The Medieval Week on Gotland. It feels a little strange but also it's like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders.

Honestly, I'm relieved. I will not have to spend all of this summer with the anxiety and pressure that comes out of feeling like I have to create new outfits for this Week of Weeks since I always spend it dressed up. Last year I brought one set of clothes that looks like something created on this side of the millennia. Those were the clothes I wore while travelling there and back.
It's fantastic but this year I can do without it. I've also finally found a job that's not in eldercare. Where I live, it's the most common job for those of us without higher education (and those of us with some useless degree in, lets say, the humanities). Almost everyone I know has at some point had a job in nursing or eldercare. Weird, isn't it? "No education? Here, take care of our sick and elderly!" Not for me, not this summer.
It's also strange that I know absolutely nothing about what will happen after my trip to New York at the beginning of June. I usually plan everything. Now, I know nothing.

Wrong. I know one thing. I will enjoy this summer. 
I have to because I've fucking earned it.

Good on you Mr. Scott

Congratulations to the wonderful Andrew Scott for winning a BAFTA award for Best Supporting Actor tonight for his mindbogglingly good performance as Jim Moriarty on the BBC tv show "Sherlock"! (Wow, long sentence. Sorry.)
To impress you further I can inform you that he beat both Stephen Rea (!) and his "Sherlock" co-actor Martin Freeman to the award.

I've been trying to figure out where this picture is from but have failed quite miserably. On the other hand it's very appropriate for tonight. He's so handsome I could die. It's strange how some people get you gasping for air just by looking at their picture, don't you think?
Anyhooooooooo...
If you haven't already I think you should take a look at Sherlock. It's a great modern take on Sherlock Holmes and everyone involved is so good it's almost ridiculous. This includes Andrew Scott, Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman but also Mark Gatiss (he and I both tweeted about Eurovision last night, he's brilliant). Gatiss also wrote the script for Sherlock together with Steven Moffat (they're more known as Mofftiss on Tumblr). Moffat is also wellknown for writing some of those emotionally damaging episodes of the revival of Doctor Who.
As of now, there are two seasons of Sherlock (season three to enter production in January 2013) with three episodes in each. Every episode is about 80 minutes long which makes them more like movies than anything else.
SEE THEM!

EDIT:
Also watch the tv show My Life In Film in which Andrew Scott is just hilarious. He's also a part of the show Blackout with Christopher Eccleston (9th Doctor). Personally, I didn't find the show itself very thrilling but Scott's performance was breathtaking. This man can play anything.

I hate essays

I like sitting in a cramped hall for six hours together with 150 other sweating students with an extremely high level of anxiety issues. Essays make want to jump through a window. Not my window sadly because I'm on the second floor with a barely ten feet drop to the ground. I don't have the discipline for this kind of shit. It involves a lot of sitting by a computer which can tempt me to stray to various internet pages much more interesting than religious ethics. Which of course should be what I'm writing about right now and not this.
I took a year off work because I know myself to be a lazy bastard who'd rather make money than study. Knowledge is beyond awesome but it can't buy me a seat on a plane to New York. I've been working my ass off every summer since I was 16 to save up money for things I enjoy. Like the car I bought. My books. My corsets. My shoes. My movies. My comics. My... stuff.
In order to have a job at all this summer I had to start working two weeks ago to introduce me to my new work assignments. It collides perfectly with the end of semester and exam weeks. So here I am. With three days to go until I have to give them my essay I have two pages and I need nine.
I'm screwed.
But I need to give it a try.
Worst case scenario - I fail the course. Which means that I have to do it again in August. It's not the first time though.
Cheers to that.

Happy Towel Day everyone!

Do all you hoopy froods know where your towels are?

Det där... eh... "livet".

Terminen börjar lida mot sitt slut och den allra sista slutspurten har påbörjats för de allra flesta universitets- och högskolestudenter i detta vårt avlånga land (alldeles för långt). Så även för mig. Vi har en hemtenta som lämnades ut till oss igår - då jag sprang runt i Borås och skyltade för RFSL Ungdom Borås' konstworkshop som hålls på lördag. Den hemtentan som ska in till skolan nästa onsdag - då jag åker på utbildningskursen i Stockholm för jobbet. Däremellan har jag jobb och sagda konstworkshop. Och styrelsemöte. Och en teaterföreställning jag lovat att jag ska gå på.
Det är knappt att jag känner att jag hinner med att fira Towel Day på fredag. Eller ja, fira och fira, jag kommer att sitta med min handduk och studera skallen av mig någonstans. Om vädret tillåter det så blir det troligen utomhus med min skräp-laptop som det varken går att spela eller surfa på (no distractions). Med en öl i näven i brist på Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters. Jag har hört att det finns en bartender i Norrköping som vet hur en bra Gargle Blaster görs. Någon som känner sig manad att slå följe med mig dit nästa år? (Och betala påföljande sjukhusräkning?)

Har äntligen fått tag i ett sommarjobb som inte har något alls att göra med vård och omsorg. Snarare tvärtom. Jag jobbar numera på Systembolaget. Det känns häftigt på något vis att äntligen tagit sig ut ur vård-träsket. Samtidigt är det frustrerande att vara ny på en arbetsplats igen och behöva lära om alla rutiner, jargonger och framför allt utbud. Jag vet inte hur många gånger varje dag jag måste förklara att jag är nyanställd och faktiskt inte kan så väldans mycket om vin. Eller öl. Eller sprit. Eller alkohol i allmänhet. Inte så att jag inte vill lära mig för det vill jag men det går aldrig tillräckligt fort i mina ögon. Nu kan jag nästan kassan helt.
Framsteg.

Men jag har fortfarande inget socialt liv att tala om. Jag hinner inte ens spela mitt svindyra nya spel.
Och Sverige är ett alldeles på tok för långsmalt land när två personer bor i varsin ände av landet.

D3 - Error 33

Haha, the list of problems with Diablo III is endless it seems. Servers have been down most part of the day for maintenance and the level of rage on Battle.net is infinite. Mostly because there's no intel whatsoever about when the servers might be up and running again.
I didn't give that huge pile of money to Blizzard to be stuck with an "Error 33" and just like some have pointed out on Battle.net: if single player had been available offline this wouldn't have been an issue. Lots of people don't like playing with others (I'm one of them) which means that playing online is completely useless for most of us. Blizzard needs to attend to this. They need additional servers for their millions of gamers before there's an assassionation.
I want to play my game.
------------------------------------
Edit:
I tried logging on at about 2:30PM and got an "Error 33". 7:40PM I could finally play again. The problem seems to be solved for now. We'll see what this week brings...

D3 - installation complete

And it's gorgeous.

D3 - installation trouble

Apparently, there are a lot of people experiencing trouble with the installation of Diablo III. I've heard accounts of the installation taking somewhere between 15 minutes to 4 hours. My installation has been going on for 45 minutes with a tenth of the game installed. In other words, my installation will be over 3 hours but it might actually work. Emphasis on might.
Now, if you excuse me, I'm gonna cancel my installation again because I need to go and will not leave the installation running while I'm gone. Hating this.

D3 - delivered

After much wait I finally received this precious gem and of course wanted to install it and enthusiastically slay as many monsters as I could in as little time as possible whilst staring at all the wonderful detail and amazing scenery. I’ve been longing to see what magic they’ve been creating this time and so I started installing. 1½ hour later roughly 14% had been installed. I abandoned the idea and tried again the following day with the same result.
As we speak I’m making another attempt at installing my, kind of very expensive, game. It’s been 30 minutes and 7% have been installed.
What am I doing wrong?
Does anyone else have this problem?
Why does this happen to me?
Murphy's Law strikes again.

The Shoes of the Fandoms

Shoes finally finished. Here's the result:

Fandoms on Right shoe (scifi):
Doctor Who
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Star Trek
Star Wars
Firefly
Fandoms on Left shoe (other):
Supernatural
Lord of the Rings
Harry Potter
Sherlock
X-Men
+ a Douglas Adams-quote on tea

"Hello, my friend. Stay a while and listen."

It feels like I should say a word or two about Diablo III and the fact that the game will finally be released from the shackles in which it has been kept for so long, deep in the dungeons of Blizzard Entertainment. May 15^th is the big date and I’ve already pre-ordered the Collector’s Edition which has apparently sold out in the web shop I ordered from. It worries me that I can’t see the product in store any longer. It doesn’t feel right. It says in the confirmation email that’s it’s a little over 6lb heavy which made me squee like crazy. It’ll be so pretty I could die.

My relationship with Diablo started in 2001 when I borrowed the first game from a classmate (read: extorted from her) and it’s been a lasting love. I recently dusted off that first game and took my time to enjoy all that nostalgia that welled up from deep inside at every quest. My favourite is still on the 14^th level where you run into the Blood Knight Lachdanan who wants nothing more than rest in peace. Find him the Golden Elixir and you’ll receive the Veil of Steel. The Halls of the Blind is another favourite.

"I can see what you see not.
Vision milky then eyes rot.
When you turn they will be gone,
Whispering their hidden song.
Then you see what cannot be,
Shadows move where light should be.
Out of darkness, out of mind,
Cast down into the Halls of the Blind."

Even though Diablo II’s aspirations were larger and the story was deepened and I bought the Diablo Archive (four Diablo novels in one) it hasn’t left the same kind of impression. As much as I wanted to try all the different classes I got tired of it too fast. Since then, I’ve waited for Diablo III and I’ve wasted my time with Titan Quest: Immortal Throne in the meantime. It’s a substitute as good as any.

But I don’t need a substitute anymore.

I can get the real thing.

Soon, precious, soon.

Back to the Big Apple

In a little more than a month I'll be going back to New York City. Last time I didn't at all get my quota of nerdiness so I'll have to make sure to make the best of it this time.
Do I have a better reason than "I wanna" to go? Why, yes. Let me tell you...
It's been a decade since one of my closest friends and I got to know each other. We soon realized that we were like two peas in a pod. Great minds think alike and all that. Suffice it to say that we hit it off and now, ten years later, we're still friends despite some rough spots along the way and huge differences in personalities. So we decided to celebrate with a trip to the USA... At first, it was supposed to be Comic-Con but that didn’t work out. We didn't get any tickets. Lucky thing we had a back-up plan.
New York City - you beautiful bitch. I need to see you in all your splendour without a f-ing volcano ruining my cool. Last time I went to NYC was April 2010 - right when the volcanic eruption on Iceland grounded all air travel in most of Europe. I was lucky who got home.
The only thing I’m bitter about with this trip is that we’re leaving the city when New York Pride begins *insert irritated face here*. But, oh well.
Since the number of visitors to this blog has gone up considerably in the last months I’m asking all of You: what are the nerdiest things one can do in New York between the dates 8^th to 16^th of June? Or not so nerdy things too for that matter, I’m open to suggestions. Anything to do with comics (Marvel, DC, Darkhorse), books (Harry Potter, LotR, GoT and other) and scifi (Star Wars, Star Trek) is good.

I efterdyningarna av This Means War

Jag finner mig själv vara heligt förbannad över filmen This Means War med Reese Witherspoon, Tom Hardy och Chris Pine. Den i stort sett enda anledningen till att jag såg filmen är för att Tom Hardy är en galet bra skådespelare (kolla Bronson, Scenes of a Sexual Nature, RocknRolla och Inception) och båda killarna är himmelskt snygga men inte ens det kunde rädda en film med ett så fruktansvärt slut.
WARNING: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!
Jag är djupt fascinerad av snabba bromance-dialoger vilket This Means War bjöd på till en början men ju längre de två vännerna Tuck (Hardy) och FDR's (Pine) kamp om Lauren (Witherspoon) gick desto mer korkat blev det. Jag njöt till fullo av de första 45-50 minuterna när skämten haglade tätt tillsammans med lite action. Sedan började det hela ta en annan vändning. Action-handlingen med tillhörande häftiga spion-moves fick inta baksätet när Tuck och FDR mer och mer inriktade sig på att vinna Laurens gunst. Hade jag slutat titta 25-30 minuter ifrån slutet så hade jag inte varit så förbannad, men curiosity killed the cat som de säger och här är jag. Sanningen att säga så ansåg jag att det enda logiska beslutet för Lauren var att dumpa båda killarna. Eller välja Tuck. Hon gjorde ingetdera.
Jag är bitter.
Fiktiva karaktärer förstör mitt liv.